Wednesday, March 28, 2007

new toy

i've been going back and forth on my underwater camera options. i think i'm struggling now because my first ever digital camera purchase for underwater turned out to be a giant stroke of luck. i was thrilled by the ability to take as many pictures as i wanted and not worry about the cost of developing the horrible, low lit blurry shots i took with my nikonos V. i knew i could never afford the rig i wanted, but i thought the nikon coolpix that was used on the ecotourist boat i worked on was a fairly decent camera. so i looked up coolpix cameras and ended up with the coolpix 4300. i bought a housing from fantasea.com and was pretty pleased with the cost of it all. because frankly, besides the cost of developing i was scared to death to take something super expensive underwater with me and lose it or flood it. so i felt comfortable with the 4300 and the housing i had. and after working with it underwater i was thrilled with the amount of success i had with it compared to the nikonos. and i decided i would buy a backup 4300 because i was so happy with it.

but i couldn't and i talk a bit more about that in this post. and i couldn't be less happy with the coolpix 5400 for underwater. and admittedly it could be operator error and the 4300 corrected for that.

as i'd been trying to get money together and my permit extended, i decided to look at a different camera for underwater purposes for my research and my book. i tried to look on flickr to see what people there are using for underwater shooting and many of them choose to hide the type of camera their using. after awhile though i did start to see a trend with canon and read a lot of user reviews of it and thought ok, i'll try the canon. of course, again, cost is a factor and yes, i know all the money over the years i spent on the 4300, 5400, housings, nikonos, film developing, etc. i could have bought a really good canon dslr and some lenses and a housing. i get it.

bygones.

i sent the specs of all the cameras i was interested in to my friend and had her make the decision for me.

so now i'm the proud owner of the Canon Powershot G7. photos taken with the 5400.

Friday, March 16, 2007

not marine, definitely research

long term butterfly research from U.C. Davis professor

http://www.sacbee.com/101/story/138397.html

http://media.sacbee.com/smedia/2007/03/14/17/72-butterflies1.embedded.prod_affiliate.4.jpg



Biggest butterfly net ever
Prof's 35-year study flutters about on Web
By Matt Weiser - Bee Staff Writer
Last Updated 12:33 am PDT Thursday, March 15, 2007
Story appeared in METRO section, Page B3

Print | E-Mail | Comments (0)


Arthur Shapiro, a professor at the University of California, Davis, studies butterflies along the American River Parkway in North Sacramento, one of 11 such sites he has frequented for the past 35 years. In so doing, he has encountered 159 species, some of which have become extinct. Sacramento Bee/Brian Baer


For 35 years, butterflies of the Sacramento Valley and the Sierra Nevada have been Arthur Shapiro's obsession.

Shapiro, a UC Davis professor of evolution and ecology, has visited the same 11 observation sites from Suisun Marsh to high mountain valleys since 1972 -- most of them every two weeks.

He has recorded more than 83,000 sightings of 159 species, representing every color of the rainbow. Along the way, new butterflies have come on the scene. Others apparently have blinked out.



Shapiro recorded all he saw. And it's all now available to the public in a massive database of regional butterfly activity that is rivaled by only one other resource worldwide.

"Butterflies have become very important indicators of global change," he said. "We want the database to be used by anyone looking to test ideas about biological responses to global change."

What makes Shapiro's database -- the fruit of his painstaking tracking of butterflies -- even more remarkable is that he does not drive.

He returns to the observation sites using public transportation and arranging rides from students and colleagues.

"I gave up driving many years ago as my contribution to public safety," said Shapiro, 61. "People whose eyes are on the roadside, rather than the road, belong in a passenger seat -- not behind the wheel."

At first it was relatively easy. He planned his 11 survey locations along Greyhound bus routes. He rode the bus, for instance, to Donner Summit, got off at Boreal Ski Resort, and hiked up to Castle Peak from there to look for butterflies.

Then Greyhound began cutting back its service and eliminating stops, including the one at Boreal. So Shapiro said he began accepting offers from others to "come along" to look for butterflies or to tap into his deep experience with local flora and fauna.

"Now, alas, I have to rely on student field assistants to access some sites as well as help with collecting the data," he said. "But they get an immersion experience in Sierran ecology."

The database became available on the Internet at http://butterfly.ucdavis.edu as of March 1. Making it public is a condition of the National Science Foundation grant that helped create it.

The resource is considered the world's largest site-specific dataset on butterfly populations collected by one person. Its only peer is a British database that covers more ground but fewer species and habitat types.

"I really applaud the effort that went into it. It's a fantastic resource," Carol Boggs, a professor of biological sciences at Stanford University, said of Shapiro's work. She has used the database in her own research. "Being able to access it more easily and more readily is going to stimulate a lot of work."

Raw numbers in the database are available only by request, primarily so Shapiro can help connect researchers probing similar questions, he said. Dozens of researchers such as Boggs already have made use of it over the years.

The Web site offers a vast resource. It includes population trends and charts, effects of weather and habitat changes, a narrative life history of each species and observation site, beautiful photographs of butterflies, tips to create a butterfly garden, even a "butterfly detective" feature to teach species identification.

Shapiro hopes the database will help reveal more about the impact of climate change on wildlife. It already has helped document that many species are moving farther upslope in the Sierra Nevada in response to warmer temperatures.

Other species apparently have gone extinct locally due to unknown changes, including, in Sacramento, the California ringlet and large marble butterflies.

"Students who don't have his long experience in the field are going to be able to mine the database ... to develop new ideas," said Boggs. "What it does is it speeds up science and it speeds up the process of discovery by having that publicly available."

Shapiro's work also has led to a book: University of California Press this spring will publish "Field Guide to Butterflies of the San Francisco Bay and Sacramento Valley Regions."

"Lots of things are happening with butterflies that people just are not aware of," he said.

Saturday, March 03, 2007

GOIN' TO THE SEMIFINALS

DodgeballPalooza Top 10 Teams as of 03/03/2007

Mens Womens
1. Dodgers Suck Hey 80s Part Duex
2. Dodgeballs To The Chin Sugar High
3. Yoga Fire You re a Dodgeball
4. Lamda Why? Mass Extinction
5. The Mangos Out Like A Fat Kid In Dodgeball
6. Athletes in Action We Can Dodge A Wrench
7. Beasts From The East The Old Ladies
8. Yea Gullll The Bouncers
9. Forged Gold Sanrio Baller-ina squad
10. Why Dodge These DodgeBalls Mad Cow Assassins


WOOOOOOOOHOOOOOOOOOOOOO!! We only lost one match out of four and we lost to Hey 80's. They were fierce and supercoordinated. we, not so much! but we creamed our other three matches and we go to the semi's at 3:30

awesome

Friday, March 02, 2007

DODGEBALL PALOOZA!!

Tonight is the 24 hour dodgeball tournament and yours truly is on a team!

It was tough to come up with an ecological AND intimidating name but i think we did it. we're MASS EXTINCTION!

oh and you know there're shirts:
dodgeballPALOOZA SHIRT DESIGN

limited edition. yours for only $10!


the tournament starts at 5 pm and here's where you can check our stats as the night goes on: women's division

Here's what our captain Brian "THERE'S NO CRYING IN DODGEBALL" Schreier sent out to the ecology grad group:
Hey Everyone,
Just a reminder that tomorrow is the dodgeball tournament where 9 of
our very own ecology women will be handing out some whoop-ass to some
unsuspecting undergrads. But they can't do it alone!! We need YOU to
come and support them! The first match is at 10:25pm Friday in the
ARC (in the MAC, the indoor soccer field at the back). And if you
feel so inclined as to be as dedicated as the players, our next
matches are at 4:15, 10:30, and 10:55 am on saturday. Body painting
and banners are welcome, but we'd be happy with you just showing up
(oh yeah...food....bring food too). We have team t-shirts for sale as
well for $10.

In case you are thinking "gosh, I would go but I probably don't know
any of the players" here is our roster of intrepid warrior women:
TEAM "MASS EXTINCTION"
-Captain Clara "metal-chewer" Elias
-Representing the
"grad-school-hardened-but-still-cuddly-on-the-inside" older students,
Michelle Buckhorn
-Mara "can-take-some-hits-to-the-head" Evans
-Sierra Evans, our small but vicious pet undergrad (i.e. mara's sister)
-Veteran dodgeballers Heather
"lull-you-into-a-false-sense-of-security" Fuller and Shannon
"I-don't-like-to-show-up-for-practice" Flynn
-Rachel "limb-ripper-offer" Fontana
-Kelly "animal-impersonator/hand-stand-wiz" Garbach (how this will
help with dodgeball we aren't quite sure yet)
-Andrea "watch-me-flail" Drauch

So come out and watch some exciting dodgeball and support your future
professional colleagues while they kick some ass!

PS There is no men's team this year because ecology men are only
barely brave enough to risk getting out of bed in the morning, let
alone compete in a sport *cough*Matt Gibbons, Kurt Vaughn, Alex
Palmerlee*cough*


WISH US LUCK!!